


In Restless Dreams I Walked Alone

by UisceOneLove



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Charles Being Confronted For His Shit, Charles Xavier Can Be An Idiot Sometimes, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Honestly Charles What Are You Thinking, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Erik Lehnsherr, Hurt/Comfort, Logan Knows What's Up, M/M, Making Up, Mentions of Suicidal Thoughts, POV Alternating, Panic Attacks, Post-Break Up, Post-Cuba (X-Men), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, X-Men: Days of Future Past Fix-it, mentions of suicidal ideation, switching POVs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 21:00:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29723154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UisceOneLove/pseuds/UisceOneLove
Summary: It is unsafe to be so exposed. It is unsafe to be in a five-pointed box--"You gonna be okay, Erik?" Logan asks, and it's like he knows before a word is uttered in reply.His lips feel tight and dry, ready to split at the cracks when he smiles. "I survive."By the skin of his teeth.
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Comments: 13
Kudos: 52





	In Restless Dreams I Walked Alone

**Author's Note:**

> This was overdue from encouragement a few certain people gave in the X-Men Discord I am a member of, because we all agreed that DOFP did not properly confront Charles' decisions or the fact that Erik just spent about a decade isolated and deprived.
> 
> So, here is my little contribution to fixing that.

Shattered glass raining down on him.

_ It's not real. _

A streak of silver.

_ He knows how to see things that are not truly there. _

"Whiiiplaaaaash."

There is pressure behind that touch. 

His stomach tries to flip like a key turning the ignition.

_ Too many words, it's not a vision-- _

Hope.

"Charles?"

Real, beautiful pain that blooms through his cheek for the first time, like a night-blooming cereus. 

"I'm  _ never _ getting in that head again."

Another blur. Metal singing a choir of welcome around him, and it's like being reborn but it's too soon to see the light.

"You abandoned me!"

It's too soon, it's too much. Can't cease the shaking, can't quiet the mind, the metal crunches under his senses like a fragile paper cup--

" _ You abandoned us all _ !"

_ You abandoned  _ **_me_ ** .

"You're like me, bub. We're survivors."

Alcohol burns so sweetly down his throat but is not ready to stay at rest in his belly.

Knight takes rook, but look--

_ He is not ready _ .

The lights are as bright as the sun in the lobby. The hushed tones of Charles checking in like nails on a chalkboard.

It is unsafe to be so exposed.

It is unsafe to be in a five-pointed box--

"Let's go." It's brusque. It lacks the lavish curl of snugness that Charles used to be.

They stand in front of another elevator, no quick-talking silver wisp waiting to make it go by faster.

It's cramped and full and they are not visions but how long does it last?

_ How long until the Charles he sees no longer has a barbed tongue? _

There are keen eyes watching but not the pair he dreamed of.

"You gonna be okay, Erik?" Logan asks, and it's like he knows before a word is uttered in reply.

His lips feel tight and dry, ready to split at the cracks when he smiles. "I survive." 

By the skin of his teeth. 

They stop six doors down and a flimsy plastic card is shoved into his hand.

"Your room." Charles is quick to break contact and move.

The opening over chess is over. Charles played checkmate.

He steps through the door alone.

It clicks shut.

_ It's the sound of silence _ .

\---

Logan and Erik are not best friends.

It would be accurate to say that they both hated each other with a very thin coat of understanding in the  _ We fought our way to strength _ way.

He did not, at any point, sign up to play therapist for Erik and Charles when he volunteered to make this trip.

But he recognized the signs in Erik. Saw his fellow soldiers with it. Saw some of the other X-Men carry it on their shoulders. 

Everyone had it in their current future. 

And Logan was getting pretty tired of this pity shit Charles was pullin. 

"This is how you're going to do this?" he demanded. Hank and Charles were already a good few paces away but they slowed to a stop.

"Excuse me?" Charles responded, turning around.

"Logan, this is not the best time," Hank advised.

"No shit it's not the best time," Logan replied. "This was not what I thought you meant when you told me that I'd have to be the one guiding you, Chuck."

Charles and Hank both looked equally confounded. "I didn't--"

"The you in the future did. I thought it was just about getting your sorry ass out of the school to save Raven. I'm going to have to charge you extra for this when I get back." 

Charles licked his lips and heaved a heavy sigh, putting on that look of inconvenience that Logan was increasingly wanting to punch. "Look, Logan, it has been a long day for all of us. I would like to retire for the evening. Wouldn't you?" 

"I'm not Hank, bub," Logan said as he approached this sorry version of his friend, "I'm not here to hold your hand and let you continue having a pity party. No offense Hank."

"Since I'm already wrapping my head around a lot of new things currently, I don't think I can take offense," Hank replied. "I thought it was easier to do."

"Extremely unhelpful, Hank," Charles gritted out.

"Look, I can't stand Lehnsherr. Even now, but I understand him." Logan was  _ really _ going to make sure his Professor pays for this therapy session. He hated doing these big emotional speeches. "He left you battered on a beach. Yeah, that's his MO, he cuts and runs when he feels betrayed. But  _ you _ , the one who lectures every single one of us about second chances and never giving up on the ones you love, let the government lock him up, isolated, with the key tossed into a vat of plastic, for ten years?"

"I was alone." Charles crossed his arms defensively and shifted on his feet. "We thought he killed--"

"Magneto's killed a lot of people and that hasn't stopped you all those other times from trying to woo his heart back," Logan cut in. "I'm not done talking."

Charles shut his mouth, jaw tense with the refrain.

"Your loneliness was self-inflicted with the chance to walk away whenever you decided. You don't know what it means to be forced into it. How it feels to have your abilities ripped away from you, to be locked away in a room with no other contact, for  _ years _ . To be caged in. Supplied with the bare minimum and no company, no entertainment, just your thoughts."

Logan stepped closer until he was in Charles' face so that he could see it get into that goddamn head. "Those thoughts turn very antagonistic  _ very _ quickly, Charles."

The man looked like a scolded child, the old gears turning the cobwebs loose. "I…"

"Ten years," Logan repeated. "In a white room at the bottom of the Pentagon with nothing but a basic bunk. He's just been broken into the real world, around people, where he can use his abilities again, and now you're shutting him off in another room by himself when he was barely processing already."

It took way too long for Charles to finally look so horrifically ashamed, but it was progress.

"I fear I've made quite a mistake."

All three of them whipped their heads around to Erik's door when the sounds of destruction seeped out. 

"Hank," Charles said, and the young gangly version of Logan's good pal was moving past them.

"On it."

\---

The bed. Big. Soft. Inviting.

Shower. Hot water. Privacy.

Light switches. His to control.

Television. Phone. Furniture.

A place to be comfortable.

Erik can't.

He's alone again and he  _ can't-- _

Shaky hands. He had shaky hands.  _ They were last like that before his mom-- _

His lungs can't hold on long enough.

The metal's shrieking around him as the television folds in on itself.

The bedposts scrunch with divots. Lamps are floating.

It's going everywhere and Erik sees it and doesn't see it all at once.

"This is exactly what I thought would happen."

"Oh my--Erik. You need to calm your mind."

There were too many stimuli. He couldn't focus. He couldn't--

"Charles, get back!"

"What the hell do you think you're doing, Professor?"

"I just need to--dammit, I still can't get in his head, I need to do something!"

"Don't--"

Everything halted and zeroed in on the feeling of arms wrapping around him and pressing him against a solid chest.

"Please, Erik," Charles's voice pleaded, so close and so real, "calm your mind, darling. You are not alone."

Tears escaped as the noise came to an abrupt halt.

Erik didn't have to think; he went lax in the safety of Charles' arms. Charles stumbled, his legs unable to keep them upright and sending them sprawling o the floor. But he didn't let go.

"Shit," a voice hissed out as Erik's connection to the metal around him severed and sent the items falling. He heard the scurry of feet as the two other occupants of the room hurried to catch what they could while the rest clattered viciously against the floor.

Charles guided Erik's face to the crook of his neck as he cried, holding him like the lover he used to be.

"I'm sorry, Erik," Charles murmured to him, "I should have known."

"Why didn't you help me?" Erik croaked into his skin. 

"We've only just seen each other again, I didn't think--"

"You left me there to die with no one to help me go peacefully."

He felt Charles stiffed, his hand freezing against Erik's back. "Pardon?"

There was no way for Erik to do it himself with the limitations. They didn't give him things that could cut. He wasn't provided with anything that could kill him from the inside out. No one would pull the trigger and there were no places for Erik to hang a noose. The security wouldn't have allotted him time to get away with anything if he had tried.

Charles' fingers gripped his shirt. "Erik, you didn't--"

"Lacked the appropriate means," Erik replied numbly.

"Oh, love," Charles said breathlessly, his hold tightening further around him. "Forgive me. I abandoned you in my anger when I had promised to never let you be alone again. I should have known it was all a lie, should have fought to keep you from being caged like an animal." 

A hand turned Erik's head so that delicate lips could touch his. It was like an old dream, the sensation familiar but hazy. Erik clung to Charles to keep the dream from slipping away and let out a pained whine into the kiss. 

"We're, um, going to leave you to it," Hank said awkwardly, shuffling toward the doorway.

"We've got our own talk to have, bub," Logan told the beast, leading him out with an arm around his shoulders. 

Erik's fingers found Charles' stringy strands of hair and wished for the soft and short wind-swept tendrils from before. Coarse facial hair scratched at Erik's lips and chin, unfamiliar. But the man beneath those was the same. It was his Charles who kissed away his tears and stroked Erik's jaw. Neither of them would be leaving the floor soon. 

"Forgive me," Charles pleaded again, returning to Erik's lips. 

The older mutant held his head to keep him there, reacquainting himself with the taste of Charles' mouth and feeling a tinge of sadness at finding a stronger hint of alcohol there. "Will you leave me at their mercy again?" he asked.

"Never," Charles swore.

"Then I can forgive."

Charles undid the first couple of buttons to Erik's shirt and slid his hand beneath the fabric, resting it against the hair-covered chest to feel the heart beating beneath it. 

"Will you leave me again?" the telepath asked.

"We are meant to protect our kind together," Erik answered, covering the hand with his own. "I will not lose you again."

"Then we have nothing left to repent."

They stayed there, lovers held and comforted, without a wish to move. The red string was pulling taught. Erik wasn't alone. Charles came for him in the end. 

They will walk on together and find Raven. They will rejoin their family. 

The world was full of color. The walls were no longer alabaster and confining. 

Erik was free. And he will be pulled back from the white room safely with Charles there.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and Kudos are appreciated!


End file.
